Archive(2016)

Rough Cut SalesRough Cut Sales

In October 2015, the evicted residents who had imprisoned on a false charge of killing a policeman assembled in a place for the first time after the Yongsan Disaster six years ago. They had occupied a watchtower against unreasonable redevelopment policies and in protest against violent suppression used by riot police in 25 hours of their sit-in demonstration. Their colleagues had died from an unknown fire, and they became criminals. The delight of meeting again lasts only briefly. The ‘comrades’ rip out cruel words while blaming each other. What happened to them in the interim?

Bassist Jang Sung-geon (age 28) and drummer Kwon Yong-man (age 30) met online in 2010 and formed a band called Bamseom Pirates with the intention of producing a kind of music befitting for a society in which everyone blindly pursues financial gain. During their first gig they performed one hundred songs in ten minutes and the crowd responded enthusiastically. Gradually, Bamseom Pirates gained fame. Then one day when they performed at a protest against a forced eviction, thugs hired by developers damaged their instruments. Kwon and Jang were outraged by it. Soon after, Park Jung-geun, a good friend of Bamseom Pirates who produced the band’s album, was arrested for violating the National Security Law and their album Seoul Inferno was presented as evidence and Kwon attended the trial as a witness.

My parents were real estate developer and dealers in the 80s. They were able to realize the “middle class dream” thanks to the property market boom in Jamsil, the “B-list Gangnam” where those who dreamed of Gangnam gathered. But after the Asian financial crisis (the so-called “IMF era” in Korea), everything vanished into thin air and our family was damaged to the core. I grew distant from my parents and didn't want to include them in my life. One day, my parents are told by the landlord to move out because our apartment will soon be reconstructed as a studio. However, my parents are far from worried about finding a new place to live; they are still waiting for a “jackpot” which they hope will help them make a golden comeback to the middle class. I having lived away from my parents for 7 years at the time, take out my camera to investigate the true face of real estate and my family history, which seemed inextricably bound together. Ultimately, I come face to face with a neoliberal era in which my family struggles to gain footing and be a family again.

A seemingly ordinary boy discovers he is the highest ranking Tibetan monk reincarnated from a past, giving him the noble title of Rinpoche. Displaced in his reincarnation in Ladakh due to the political instability in Tibet, he is separated from his former monastery. Filmed over 8 years, the young reincarnate faces questions of survival, coming-of-age, and serving a sacred order. With one aging godfather on the backdrop of the biting Himalayan Mountains, the Rinpoche sets on a journey to find his place in the world.

A popular Korean opera singer started the Banana Children’s Choir in Pune, India. His quick temper earned him a nick-name ‘Angry Bird,’ but he has been making significant changes in the lives of his choir children. Frustrated by the lack of support from the parents, the Angry Bird decides to train the parents to sing for a joint concert with their children. Probably the toughest challenge of his life.